Work

Areas of expertise: 

Methane emissions, environmental impacts of energy systems, environmental justice

Daniel Zavala-Araiza is a senior scientist working in the Office of Chief Scientist as part of the EDFE team. His current research focuses on providing actionable data that can accelerate the mitigation of methane emissions. He leads and coordinates research projects around the world improving the understanding of how much and where methane pollution is taking place. He is based in Utrecht, The Netherlands where he is also a visiting researcher at Utrecht University.

Dr. Zavala-Araiza obtained a B.Sc. in chemical engineering from the Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico City, and a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin, where he carried out research on the environmental implications of shale gas production.

Publications

Plant, Genevieve, Eric A. Kort, Adam R. Brandt, Yuanlei Chen, Graham Fordice, Alan M. Gorchov Negron, Stefan Schwietzke, Mackenzie Smith, and Daniel Zavala-Araiza. "Inefficient and unlit natural gas flares both emit large quantities of methane." Science 377, no. 6614 (2022): 1566-1571.

Omara, Mark, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, David R. Lyon, Benjamin Hmiel, Katherine A. Roberts, and Steven P. Hamburg. "Methane emissions from US low production oil and natural gas well sites." Nature communications 13, no. 1 (2022): 1-10.

Irakulis-Loitxate, Itziar, Javier Gorroño, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, and Luis Guanter. "Satellites detect a methane ultra-emission event from an offshore platform in the Gulf of Mexico." Environmental Science & Technology Letters (2022).

Shen, Lu, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, Ritesh Gautam, Mark Omara, Tia Scarpelli, Jianxiong Sheng, Melissa P. Sulprizio et al. "Unravelling a large methane emission discrepancy in Mexico using satellite observations." Remote Sensing of Environment 260 (2021): 112461.

Zavala-Araiza Daniel, Mark Omara, Ritesh Gautam, Mackenzie L. Smith, Sudhanshu Pandey, Ilse Aben, Victor Almanza-Veloz et al. "A tale of two regions: methane emissions from oil and gas production in offshore/onshore Mexico." Environmental Research Letters 16, no. 2 (2021): 024019.

Maazallahi, Hossein, Julianne M. Fernandez, Malika Menoud, Daniel Zavala-Araiza, Zachary D. Weller, Stefan Schwietzke, Joseph C. Von Fischer, Hugo Denier Van Der Gon, and Thomas Röckmann. "Methane mapping, emission quantification, and attribution in two European cities: Utrecht (NL) and Hamburg (DE)." Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics 20, no. 23 (2020): 14717-14740.

Alvarez, Ramón A., Daniel Zavala-Araiza, David R. Lyon, David T. Allen, Zachary R. Barkley, Adam R. Brandt, Kenneth J. Davis et al. "Assessment of methane emissions from the US oil and gas supply chain." Science 361, no. 6398 (2018): 186-188.